Rare Black Moon Set To Rise This Friday

By All That's Interesting

Published September 27, 2016

Matt Cardy/Getty Images

There’s the full moon, the supermoon, the blue moon, the pink moon, the strawberry moon, the harvest moon, and far too many others to count. But none may be as compelling, or as ominous, as the black moon.

And this rare moon, which only occurs once every 32 months, is set to rise in the Western Hemisphere on September 30.

We can understand what the black moon is and why it’s so rare by thinking about its more common cousin: the new moon. That occurrence marks the lunar phase in which the earth-facing side of the moon is in full shadow, with no solar rays to illuminate it. And the black moon is the second new moon within a month.

On the other hand, each month contains one full moon, when the earth-facing side of the moon is fully illuminated by the Sun. But when a rare second full moon occurs within a single month, it’s known as the illustrious blue moon (although that branding, like all lunar branding, is problematic for some scientists).

While both the blue moon and the black moon are certainly rare, the former is strikingly visible while the latter is virtually not. Given its very shadowy nature, the black moon is invisible to the naked eye.

Nevertheless, that won’t stop at least some pagans and Wiccans from taking advantage of this powerful moment in the spiritual world, at which time any magic is believed by some to be especially potent.

And if that’s not spooky enough, a second black moon is actually set to occur this Halloween. If these things are only supposed to occur once every 32 months, that timing is pretty strange indeed.